The selection trial had begun.

The big mushroom was still slowly rotating, and the cultivators below Wangxian Terrace had already surged forward, each displaying their abilities as they climbed up the cone-shaped stone mountain.

Zanxing also walked up.

Only when she got close did she discover that this stone mountain was formed in a very ingenious way. Looking up from under the mushroom cap, the stone wall was extremely steep with a very large incline. Fortunately, the stone wall wasn’t smooth – there were still footholds, but the distance between footholds was considerable, making it much more difficult than ordinary rock climbing.

Zanxing tried grasping the stones and climbing up.

Her movements weren’t very fast. When she stepped up, she felt her body sway violently. The mushroom mountain was constantly rotating slowly, and climbing up a moving mountain was not an easy task.

Some cultivators with higher cultivation had already climbed up above, but their speed gradually slowed down. Zanxing wasn’t in a hurry. Although she no longer remembered the details, she vaguely felt that the original protagonist’s first face-slapping moment probably wasn’t this easy.

Sure enough, when she had only climbed about a small portion of the way, a burly cultivator in front of her had already discovered a Mountain Chain Flower before him. Without a word, he planned to pick the flower, but the moment his hand touched the petals, those petals suddenly grew larger with the wind. The five purple petals abruptly elongated, instantly transforming into a withered, thin human hand glowing with dark purple, and slammed viciously toward the burly man’s chest.

This mushroom mountain had no safety ropes – people could only rely on their two hands to grasp the stone wall and climb up. Caught off guard, the burly man was struck in the chest by that ghost hand flower, spat out a mouthful of blood, and fell backward.

The dull “thud” made people’s hearts run cold.

At the same time, screams came from all around, along with the “thump” sounds of people falling from high places, rising and falling in succession without end.

Zi Luo stood on Wangxian Terrace with her hands behind her back, watching as Taiyan Sect disciples moved away the fallen and injured cultivators, while saying: “The ‘Mountain Chain Flower’ has another name – it’s called the ‘Ghost Hand Flower.’ Wanting to pick a flower is not a simple matter.”

Most of the cultivators who had been eager to pick flowers just now had fallen into the trap. Only a small portion with high cultivation barely managed to grab onto the stone wall to avoid falling. Even so, the participants were instantly reduced by half.

The burly man in front had fallen. Zanxing carefully observed the flower before her.

This was a small purple flower with five petals. The stamen was golden yellow and glowed, and when she leaned close to smell it, she could detect a faint, light fragrance. From its appearance, it looked completely harmless. But Zanxing still remembered the scene she had just witnessed – when people approached the flower, it would instantly transform into the appearance of a dead person’s hand. Those with poor psychological resilience wouldn’t even need to be struck; they’d be scared to death by themselves.

Should she fight with this flower?

Zanxing hesitated for a moment. Just then, her chest felt slightly warm, and Xiaoyuan Pearl began to stir restlessly again.

Whether it was her imagination or not, Zanxing could see that from the purple flower in front of her, wisps of light gradually seeped out from the golden stamen, seeming to have life, like the steam rising from freshly brewed tea. This looked very much like heaven and earth, Yuanli. Zanxing extended one hand, not attempting to pick the flower first, but covering it above the flower.

The moment she covered it, the Xiaoyuan Pearl in her body suddenly began rotating frantically. The Yuanli seeping from the stamen drilled into Zanxing’s body strand by strand, being devoured in large gulps by the Xiaoyuan Pearl. In just a moment, that flower had been drained of its last bit of golden light and became dim.

Zanxing pondered briefly, then stretched out her left hand while her right hand tightly gripped a protruding corner of the stone wall, carefully picking that “Mountain Chain Flower.”

The flower lay quietly in her palm without transforming into a ghost hand, without attacking Zanxing, without any change at all.

Zanxing suddenly understood. The reason this flower could transform was because of some kind of Yuanli in the stamen. However, this type of Yuanli happened to be absorbable by the Xiaoyuan Pearl. After Zanxing used the Xiaoyuan Pearl to completely absorb the Yuanli from the stamen, this “Mountain Chain Flower” became an ordinary flower with no offensive capability whatsoever.

This was too convenient.

With this realization, Zanxing wasn’t in a hurry anymore. Compared to other cultivators who needed to go through great hardships fighting ghost hand flowers to pick them, she only needed to use the Xiaoyuan Pearl to drain the Yuanli before picking the flowers. Picking quickly wasn’t as good as picking steadily – she slowly climbed up, not worried about having no flowers to pick.

At the same time, she also saw an acquaintance, Mu Cengxiao was climbing up using both hands and feet. Seeing Zanxing in front of him, Mu Cengxiao was also stunned for a moment. He had thought Zanxing would have been eliminated long ago, but unexpectedly, she was still here, even waving at him with a relaxed expression.

“You’ve picked quite a few.” Zanxing glanced at the flowers in Mu Cengxiao’s basket. In such a short time, he had already picked five flowers.

The young man stared at her warily: “What do you want to do?”

“Don’t worry, I won’t steal yours.” Zanxing continued climbing up. “I wish you success in advancing.”

Mu Cengxiao paused, always feeling that the current Zanxing was indescribably strange. However, at the moment, he had no mind to waste on Zanxing.

The higher up they went, the smoother the stone walls of the mushroom mountain became. At the same time, the big mushroom’s rotation speed also began to accelerate, making people dizzy from the swaying. Although there were more Mountain Chain Flowers at higher places, climbing to high places was also more dangerous – they might fall from above before even picking flowers. Many cultivators were unwilling to climb higher, but worried that they didn’t have enough flowers to enter the Taiyan Sect, so they set their sights on fellow participating cultivators.

For a time, on the mushroom mountain, people fought each other for flowers, and there were more “thump” “thump” sounds.

“I can’t do it anymore—” Wang Shao exhaled, panting heavily: “I can’t climb any higher.”

Duan Xiangrao frowned, disdain flashing in her eyes, but she smiled on the surface: “Indeed, this mountain is too high.”

Both of them were at Mid Foundation Establishment, which was considered quite good here. Even so, continuing upward would be somewhat strenuous. The two of them traveled together, which made other cultivators not dare to openly rob them, so their journey had been relatively smooth. Two people looking out for each other was much better than fighting alone.

However, now they seemed to have reached a bottleneck.

Duan Xiangrao looked at her own and Wang Shao’s baskets. She had twelve Mountain Chain Flowers, Wang Shao had sixteen. Although it wasn’t few, it wasn’t particularly many either. However, the cultivators who had made it this far were all carefully selected. To have them rob others would risk losing more than they gained.

Just as she was calculating in her heart, Duan Xiangrao’s gaze suddenly fell on a familiar figure behind them. She was stunned for a moment and quickly called Wang Shao over: “Young Master Wang, look!”

Not far from the two of them, Zanxing was slowly climbing up with her basket on her back. Her movements were as slow as a turtle, but what shocked Wang Shao was that she was still here?

“Young Master Wang, look at her basket—” Duan Xiangrao reminded him.

Wang Shao looked over, and his gaze immediately became fixed.

There, stacked neatly, was a pile of Mountain Chain Flowers – at least twenty of them.